Video: Mullen, Kerry, Levin, Sessions, roundtable

Transcript of: Mullen, Kerry, Levin, Sessions, roundtable

MR. DAVID GREGORY:This Sunday, breaking news:
Attack
on
Libya
.
U.S.
, French and
British forces
target Libyan air defenses in
support
of
rebels
fighting to overthrow Libyan ruler
Moammar Gadhafi
.
President Obama
insisted the
attack
only followed
Gadhafi
's refusal to end his assault as the
United Nations resolution
demanded.

PRES. BARACK OBAMA:We are answering the calls of a threatened people, and we are acting in the interests of the
United States
and the
world
.

SEC'Y HILLARY CLINTON:We have every reason to fear that left unchecked,
Gadhafi
will commit unspeakable atrocities.

MR. GREGORY:This morning, the very latest on the
military campaign
, its goal and its limits, including the president's order that no
U.S.ground troops
be committed. With us, the president's top
military
adviser, chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff
, Admiral
Mike Mullen
. Then, reaction from
Capitol Hill
. Is
Libya
a threat to the
United States
? Is it too late for
military action
to make a difference? And should the president have sought congressional authority? With us, chairman of the
Senate Armed Services Committee
, Senator
Carl Levin
of
Michigan
; chairman of the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee
,
Senator John Kerry
of
Massachusetts
; and Republican member of the
Armed Services Committee
, Senator
Jeff Sessions
of
Alabama
. Finally, our roundtable assesses the president's
leadership
as he manages a
crisis
in the
Middle East
and confronts the still unfolding dangers from
Japan
's nuclear emergency. With us,
NBC News
chief
foreign affairs
correspondent
Andrea Mitchell
,
NBC News
chief
Pentagon
correspondent
Jim Miklaszewski
, White House correspondent for
The New York Times Helene Cooper
, former director of the
CIA General Michael Hayden
, and president of the
Council of Foreign Relations Richard Haass
.

Announcer:From
NBC News
in
Washington
,
MEET THE PRESS
with
David Gregory
.

MR. GREGORY:Good morning. Libyan leader
Moammar Gadhafi
took to the airwaves this morning vowing to stay and fight, and calling the airstrikes on his
country
tantamount to
terrorism
.
Anti-aircraft
fire painted the skies over
Tripoli
overnight after
allied forces
launched
Operation Odyssey Dawn
to prop up rebel forces against the
Gadhafigovernment
. Earlier in the day the French took the lead as their war planes patrolled the skies over
Libya
and struck pro-
Gadhafi
tanks. U.S. and
British forces
followed by launching a volley of more than 100 cruise missiles and heavy bombing during strikes that targeted Libyan air defenses and communications facilities.
The U.S.
currently has at least 11 naval vessels in the Mediterranean in addition to
surveillance aircraft
.
All of this
in preparation to impose a
U.N.
-sanctioned no-fly zone. It is the largest
military intervention
since the invasion of
Iraq
in
2003
, eight years to the day. Want to go right to
NBC
's chief
foreign affairs
correspondent
Richard Engel
, who's in
Tobruk
,
Libya
.
Richard
, you have been traveling from
Egypt
through eastern
Libya
. Tell me what you've been seeing and experiencing.

RICHARD ENGEL reporting:The roads are remarkably calm, people are out on the streets. I spoke with
rebels
just a short while ago. They say that finally this action has taken
place
, and they hope that they can get some more momentum again. I was here in this area about a week ago when the tide of events seemed to be turning against the
rebels
, and you didn't see them out much, they were abandoning their checkpoints. Now, once again, their checkpoints are out, and they were painting anti-
Gadhafi
graffiti, once again openly, on some of the buildings. So they feel that they have a renewed sense of optimism, and they hope to regain the momentum in this fight.

MR. GREGORY:Too little, too late is a question you keep hearing,
Richard
. I've heard your reporting on this. They had momentum a couple of
weeks
ago.

ENGEL:They certainly did. And the
rebels
are asking why didn't this come even a few days ago, before the, the major push into
Benghazi
-- which appears to have been repulsed -- actually took
place
at all. They had momentum right when they, when they began, and as soon as they left
Benghazi
they, they found themselves being crushed from the air. An
air cover
, an air cap over eastern
Libya
will give the
rebels
time to regroup, they say, time to take care of some of their wounded and perhaps learn from some of the mistakes that they made in the
early days
and try and advance with
a little bit more
skill and patience than they certainly exhibited in the, in the last time they tried to march toward
Libya
, which was really just wild firing in the air...

MR. GREGORY:Right.

ENGEL:...and a completely uncoordinated
effort
.

MR. GREGORY:Richard
, finally, based on your experience in the
region
and your reporting, what is
Gadhafi
up to?

ENGEL:Gadhafi
seems to be laying the ground for an insurgency. He said today that he will give out today a million weapons to men and women mostly around
Tripoli
. He announced today that he will be opening the armory for all Libyans who want to fight to defend their
country
. And he said today that there will be a long war for
Libya
. So he seems to be preparing for allowing his people to fight and to drag the
West
and drag the
rebels
here in the east into some sort of
war of attrition
.

MR. GREGORY:Just quickly, though, is there any sense that he's feeling more pressure than he has in the past that somebody around him might kill him, or that he might decide to step down?

ENGEL:The one indication that he might be feeling physical pressure is that he has invited hundreds of supporters to live in presidential compounds, effectively as
human shields
. That is something that the
U.S.
is clearly going to be concerned about, and there have been people volunteering to go to sites that could be attacked by American or other Western missiles or
air power
. So that is -- could be an indication that he is nervous.

MR. GREGORY:Our chief foreign correspondent
Richard Engel
,
thank you very much
. Joining me now, the president's top
military
adviser, the chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff
, Admiral
Mike Mullen
. Welcome back to
MEET THE PRESS
.

ADM. MIKE MULLEN:Good morning,
David
.

MR. GREGORY:Admiral, are we at war with
Libya
?

ADM. MULLEN:We are
-- actually started yesterday
limited
operation and, and narrow in scope focused on supporting the
United Nations Security Council resolution
which very specifically focused on
humanitarian
efforts protecting the civilians in
Libya
.
And I
'd also say that operations yesterday went, went very well. Certainly, the, the -- in, in putting in
place
a no-fly zone, which is what we're, what we're doing right now. And, effectively, he hasn't had any
aircraft
or helicopters fly in the last couple days. So effectively that no-fly zone has, has been put in
place
.

MR. GREGORY:But just to speak plainly about it, as you've said, any no-fly zone begins with an act of war. This is war against
Libya
.

ADM. MULLEN:Well, what we did, certainly, is we took out his, his radars, his ability to, to, for the most part,
attack
us from the ground, and that's how you start to set up a no-fly zone. Again, it's very focused on ensuring that he can't execute -- continue to execute his own people. And we don't see any indications of any kind of large-scale massacre at this particular point in time.

MR. GREGORY:Let's look at the map here and talk about both the geography and some of the strikes. These are, according to the
Defense Department
, where some of the strikes are. Obviously
Tripoli
, which is where
Gadhafi
is. In
Benghazi
you don't see any
strike
points on that particular map. We know from our reporting out of our own folks at the
Pentagon
that
B-2
bombers were deployed, dropping some 40 bombs against
air defense systems
within
Libya
. What is the concentration in
Tripoli
vs.
Benghazi
?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, I think as you look at that, most of those targets were part of his
air defense system
. And we also hit some of his airfields -- again, these -- this -- these are almost -- they're prerequisites for establishing a no-fly zone. And then we put
combat air patrol
,
CAP
, up above in various places, and we've got a -- we've got -- them
aircraft
stationed above
Benghazi
right now on a 24/7 basis. And then what, what we'll see do -- what we'll do is we'll move that, that capping capability, those
aircraft
,
over time
further to the west. But most of those strikes took out his air defenses and hit his airfields.

MR. GREGORY:Is there more to be done to limit his capacity to either
attack
planes or to
attackrebels
?

ADM. MULLEN:Some of the engagements yesterday included attacking his forces on the ground in the vicinity of
Benghazi
, and clearly the objective will be to, to
attack
those forces and ensure they are unable to continue to
attack
the innocent civilians, which he was doing as recently as yesterday morning in
Benghazi
.

ADM. MULLEN:Well, all of these targets were looked at in
terms
of absolutely minimizing collateral damage. And the reports I've seen have indicated minimum collateral damage. I haven't seen any reports of civilian,
civilian casualties
.
And I
think, true to form, what
Gadhafi
has done is -- has put in
place
both
human shields
in some cases, as well as created or, or said that we have generated
civilian casualties
. I just haven't seen it.

MR. GREGORY:What else do you expect him to do in the coming hours and days? There is a stockpile believed to be a mustard gas. He's talked about lashing out using
terrorism
against Western interests. What do you expect?

ADM. MULLEN:We've focused very heavily on, on the chemical capability that he has and don't see any indication that that's -- that he's moving on that. We, we've been focused on that for days. This is the -- yesterday and, and today is the first phase of a multi-phase operation, but what we expected is him to stay down, not fly his
aircraft
, not
attack
his own people and to allow the
humanitarian
efforts, which is such a significant part of the
United Nations resolution
, to take
place
.

MR. GREGORY:The goal, as the president has stated it, is to protect civilians. But he's also made it very
clear
that
Gadhafi
has to go. How, with this kind of
limitedmilitary operation
, can you achieve that goal?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, in the next few days,
David
-- first of all, I would expect us to pass the
leadership
of the
military operation
to be led by those in the
coalition
, and that the
United States
, in particular, would
support
with unique capabilities, which could include jamming, intelligence
support
, the kinds of things that -- tanker
support
for the
aircraft
, those kinds of things. And then to
support
the kind of
humanitarianeffort
that I talked about. And then I think
over time
, obviously,
Colonel Gadhafi
's going to have to -- he's going to have to make some decisions. Clearly, there's been significant international isolation, significant sanctions, an arms embargo, an off -- and, and a very broad
coalition
internationally to isolate him.
And I
think he's going to have to make some choices about his own future at that point.

MR. GREGORY:But I mean, you know, we may have -- maybe we had a lot of faith in him making the right choices since we've been after him for decades. He hasn't done that. Do we have it in our interest and in our plans to go get him?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, I -- certainly, we've looked at, as we prepared for this, all kinds of options. The president's been very
clear
that we're not going to put any
boots on the ground
. This isn't about occupation in any way, shape or form.

MR. GREGORY:But what if doesn't work? What if the goal of preventing civilian death, or the goal of getting him out of power doesn't work? Why put that limit in
place
?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, I think certainly the no-fly zone will allow us to continue to both
attack
and monitor his forces. And, at least initially, it looks like it's had a positive impact in
terms
of preventing further
civilian casualties
. And, and then I think that what happens next in speculating about that is there's uncertainty associated with that. The whole idea's to put as much pressure on this guy so he doesn't continue to kill his own people, and isolate him internationally, which he is, I believe, more than he has ever been.

MR. GREGORY:But isn't it a legitimate -- it's not just a diplomatic question, it's a
military
question. If the goals do not prevent
Gadhafi
from going,
what do we do
? There's the prospect of
Gadhafi
holed up in
Tripoli
, a divided
Libya
. This is not a sustainable strategy.

ADM. MULLEN:This is -- certainly the goals of this campaign right now again are
limited
, and it isn't, it isn't about seeing him go. It's about supporting the
United Nations resolution
, which talked to limiting or eliminating the -- his ability to kill his own people, as well as
support
the
humanitarianeffort
.

MR. GREGORY:So the
mission
can be accomplished and
Gadhafi
can remain in power?

ADM. MULLEN:That's certainly, potentially, one outcome.

MR. GREGORY:Is this in our vital interest as a
country
?

ADM. MULLEN:It's -- I think the president's made it very
clear
that our
national interests
are tied to a
country
that is so close to us in the Mediterranean, that borders
Egypt
and
Tunisia
, two countries that are also undergoing significant change as we speak, and clearly, the focus on the
humanitarian
piece in
terms
of someone who has massacred his people in the past and preventing that. In that regard, it is.

MR. GREGORY:But there are also questions about the
double standard
here. Why do we make a move on
Libya
, and yet in
Bahrain
, where Saudis send troops in to help a monarchy, we stand back?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, again, this
mission
is very focused on
Libya
, and we're paying a lot of attention to what's going on in
Bahrain
and in the
Persian Gulf
as well. And the other thing is, each one of these countries, I think, is different. We've tried to focus on it in a different way. We've had a great friendship with
Bahrain
for, for many, many decades. We've got one of our main naval base -- bases are there. And we're working hard to
support
that, in a way, to certainly see a peaceful outcome there in
terms
of how it evolves when the Bahraini people are asking for change as well.

MR. GREGORY:Is it possible that it's too late to really make a difference here? Had a no-fly zone been implemented a couple of
weeks
ago when the
rebels
had more momentum that that would have been the time to act and now it's too late?

ADM. MULLEN:Oh, I think that's speculation,
David
. I just -- I, I don't know that going two
weeks
ago would have turned this
one way or another
. Essentially, I think it was important to have the international sanctioning, the
United Nations resolution
and, and the
coalition
, a broad
coalition
which both condemns him and actually acts against him in
terms
of implementing the specifics of the no-fly zone.

MR. GREGORY:How long will this go on?

ADM. MULLEN:I --
it's hard
to say how long it will go on. I actually -- I mean, over the last
24 hours
there's been a significant amount of progress. As I said, effectively the no-fly zone has been put in
place
. We have halted him in the vicinity of
Benghazi
, which is where he was most recently on the march. And then it's hard to say what'll happen in the next few days or
weeks
.

MR. GREGORY:And what happens if
Gadhafi
goes? Are we prepared to see the
rebels
put forward a leader for that
country
?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, I've -- we've actually been in touch with the opposition in
terms
of understanding what they want, but I think there's certainly a lot of work to do to, to look at what the next steps would be with respect to what will happen in that
country
, and that would principally be left up to the people in
Libya
.

MR. GREGORY:A third war in a
Muslim country
, eight years after the invasion of
Iraq
, is this simply too much for the
United States
to take on?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, certainly, I'm very much aware of, of the, the significant steps we've taken and that this is a, certainly, another -- an additional fight. That said, we're more than capable of meeting the needs. Again, this is a, this is a
limited
, narrowly scoped
mission
, and we have the capability and capacity and, as has been the case for so long, we've got great, great people, and they've executed exceptionally well.

MR. GREGORY:Do I detect any reluctance from you, though?

ADM. MULLEN:No. None whatsoever. None whatsoever. I mean, the president has said this is a
mission
to carry out, and we are, in fact, executing it and we can do that within the -- you know, within even the, the, the challenges and stress that are presented broadly across the force.

MR. GREGORY:Is it possible that the
United States
will take a backseat in this
effort
very quickly?

ADM. MULLEN:Well, they're -- we're looking to, while leading it now, we're looking to hand off that
leadership
in the next few days. This is a
military operation
, so that's got to be done smoothly. There's a
coalition
which has come together, a commitment to a
coalition
lead with respect to this, and we would expect that to happen in the near future. And then we will provide the kind of
support
and unique capabilities that I spoke to earlier.

MR. GREGORY:Admiral
Mullen
, we'll be following it all closely.
Thank you very much
.

MR. GREGORY:Coming up, reaction from
Capitol Hill
on the
U.S.strike
in
Libya
. Senators
Kerry
,
Levin
and
Sessions
join me, up next, right after this brief commercial break.

MR. GREGORY:We are back, our special
Libya
coverage, joined now by the top foreign policymakers in the
Senate
. From
Cairo
, the chairman of the
Foreign Relations Committee
, Democrat Senator
John Kerry
; chairman of the
Senate Armed Services Committee
, Democrat
Carl Levin
of
Michigan
; and Republican members of the
Armed Services Committee
, Senator
Jeff Sessions
. Welcome to all of you. In
terms
of the
end game
here, Senators,
President Obama
earlier this month couldn't have been more
clear
in
terms
of what he wanted to happen to
Colonel Gadhafi
. Listen.

PRES. BARACK OBAMA:Let me just be very unambiguous about this.
Colonel Gadhafi
needs to step down from power and leave.

MR. GREGORY:And yet, Senator
Kerry
, I want to hear from all of you in
terms
of reacting to this. You heard from Admiral
Mullen
this morning that, in fact,
Gadhafi
could remain in power and this
military mission
could still be seen as a success. Do you agree with that?

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA):Well, the goal of this
mission
,
David
, is not to get rid of
Gadhafi
, and that's not what the
United Nations
licensed.
And I
would not call it going to war. This is a very
limited
operation that is geared to save lives, and it was specifically targeted on a
humanitarian
basis. It is not geared to try to get rid of
Gadhafi
. He has not been targeted. That is not what is happening here. So, in my judgment, we have to see where we go from here. Remember, in
Kosovo
after the initial efforts, President
Martti Ahtisaari
of
Finland
and
Viktor Chernomyrdin
of the
Soviet Union
came and were --
Russia
were involved immediately in diplomacy, and he ultimately was persuaded to do things. I think there's a lot of room here for a lot of different initiatives. But this operation was not specifically geared to get rid of
Gadhafi
.

MR. GREGORY:Well, Senator
Levin
, is that the right outcome? Again, the president couldn't have been any more
clear
about what he wants to have happen, and yet he's launched a
military operation
without that goal?

SEN. CARL LEVIN (D-MI):He has a
military operation
with very
clearmission
, and that's what the president should do is have a
clearmission
and to avoid
mission creep
. And one of the things that I know our
military
are very -- were very concerned about was that there could be
mission creep
. They don't have that concern anymore because this
mission
has been very carefully
limited
. After a few days there's going to be a handoff. After the air is cleared of any threats, there's going to be a handoff to our allies, and this
mission
will then be carried on by French, by British, and by
Arab countries
. And that's very important. One of the reasons I predict that there will be strong bipartisan
support
in the
Congress
for the president's decision is because it is a
limitedmission
, no
boots on the ground
, and because he has done this with great caution, with great care.
And I
saw that in person in the
White House
on Friday and was very impressed...

MR. GREGORY:Well...

SEN. LEVIN:...by the caution and the care that the president is putting into this.

MR. GREGORY:Senator
Sessions
, as a Republican, do you
support
what the president's done, specifically some of the limits he's placed on no
U.S.ground forces
being committed?

SEN. JEFF SESSIONS (R-AL):I'm supportive of that at this point.
And I
do think, however, the no-fly zone, as it's being executed, has proven Senator
Kerry
and
Senator McCain
in their call for a no-fly zone correct. They did that several
weeks
ago. And certainly, had it been done several
weeks
ago, we'd be in better shape than we are today. So the fact that it has been...

MR. GREGORY:Are you actually concerned that this is too little, too late?

SEN. SESSIONS:Well, I think that's a very real concern. We could end up with the, the
rebels
having lost momentum and creating a prolonged stalemate in which
Libya
and the people of
Libya
are subjected to violence for months and maybe even longer than that.

MR. GREGORY:Senator
...

SEN. SESSIONS:We -- I can't quite see where we are heading. I can't see exactly where the endgame is, and I do think it is a troubling
situation
. We just hope for the best and maybe this will be successful. But I don't see the certainty of it for sure.

MR. GREGORY:Senator
Kerry
, to kind of synthesize some of reaction out there, it's -- what are we doing? What are we doing in
Libya
? Your
ranking member
on the
Foreign Relations Committee
told our own chief
foreign affairs
correspondent
Andrea Mitchell
on her program on
MSNBC
a couple of
weeks
ago the following. I'll put it up on the screen. "Our dilemma," Senator
Lugar
said, "very frankly, is that we are not in a position to police each of these countries to establish governments that we believe are just for the people, and even to find partners, in some cases, who are likely to exemplify our ideals of
human rights
and democracy."

SEN. KERRY:Well, Senator
Lugar
is a wise, wise, you know, counselor on these issues, and I have nothing but enormous respect for him. But we're not policing
Libya
. We are engaged in a
humanitarian
initiative to prevent the slaughter of innocent people, to prevent a dictator from dragging people out of hospital beds, and they disappear, and he kills them, to ruling his
country
by pure force when there is an indigenous movement to try to join with the rest of the countries in this
Arab
awakening that is taking
place
. And the important thing here,
David
, is to see this in the larger context. I think we have enormous interest here personally, the interest of making
clear
to Tunisians, to Egyptians, to others who are moving towards this awakening that the
rest of the world
is not going to stand by while people are slaughtered by somebody who has lost...

MR. GREGORY:But, Senator
Kerry
, I have to interrupt.

SEN. KERRY:...all legitimacy to be able to govern. Let -- yeah.

MR. GREGORY:Senator
Levin
, there is a
double standard
at work here. I mean, how do you not look at the
region
...

SEN. KERRY:No.

MR. GREGORY:...and say, well, the
United States
did not intervene on behalf of Shiites who were being repressed by a
Sunni
monarchy in
Bahrain
when Saudis sent in troops, but we're choosing
Libya
to take this stand...

SEN. KERRY:Well,
David
...

MR. GREGORY:...and when a lot of people think -- let Senator
Levin
respond to this -- this is a
civil war
that we're intervening in.

SEN. KERRY:But can I just add that I profoundly disagree with that.

SEN. LEVIN:Yeah. What you're missing, it seems to me -- now, what you're missing here very, very -- you're missing a lot here is that this is the
world
that has made a decision. This is a unique
situation
where the entire
world
has come together, including the
Arab world
, and has said the
Gadhafi
slaughter needs to be stopped. It is not just we, the
United States
. It's quite the opposite. One of the reasons there will be congressional
support
here is that the president has taken the time to put the
world community
together, to get the
world community
to say to
Gadhafi
, "This slaughter must stop." That is not true in those other countries, and it's a very important fact.

MR. GREGORY:OK. Senator
Kerry
, go ahead, make your point on this as well.

SEN. KERRY:Well, I have a couple of points to make. Number one, the president has been
crystal clear
about
Bahrain
. He has said that the violence needs to stop in
Bahrain
. The crown prince of
Bahrain
has offered to have a mediation, to have a
national
dialogue. And the truth is that, in
Bahrain
where there is a 70 percent
Shia population
, you have a certain amount of mischief being made by
Iran
and by
Hezbollah
, and it's simply not the same
situation
. But moreover, the
Arab
community, I mean, the
Arab League
, is the game changer here. They asked us to come in.
The Gulfstates
, the
GCC
, asked us to come in. The opposition pleaded with the
international community
to help prevent this slaughter. I think it would be unconscionable in the face of the first time the
Arab League
and the
Gulf states
are turning to the
world
for help in order to move towards greater enfranchisement of their people for the
United States
to move away.

MR. GREGORY:Quickly...

SEN. KERRY:That would be a denial of everything we, we supported in
Egypt
, of everything we've supported in
Tunisia
, of everything we
support
every single day with respect to democracy and freedom.

MR. GREGORY:I want -- Senator Sessions -- I want to ask one other question on this before I want to get to some of your views on
Japan
and the fallout for
America
. Senator
Sessions
, should the president have consulted and sought authorization from
Congress
for this action?

SEN. SESSIONS:I'm not sure he needed to have done that, but I frankly think we could have been better briefed on it. Senator
Levin
, I know, and I'm sure
Senator McCain
and Senator
Kerry
and, and
Lugar
have gotten more briefings than the average member of the
Senate
and
House
has gotten. But it is a factor that we know that the president has to be in contact with
Congress
. He's now out of the
country
, and that probably has been less than it should have been at this point.

MR. GREGORY:I want to turn to
Japan
, another
crisis
that the president is facing, and, of course, what the Japanese are dealing with. Here are some of the latest facts to emerge out of the disaster in
Japan
. The death toll now upwards of 8,100. Still so many missing, and the number of missing well over 12,000. Some signs of hope, though. Incredible images coming out of
Japanearly today
from
Ishinomaki
as there were incredible rescues of a, of a teenager as well as an 80-year-old grandmother who was stuck inside of her
house
. Thankfully, though, those two people were rescued. But, Senator
Levin
, the -- as the nuclear emergency continues in
Japan
there are real questions about the future of
nuclear power
in this
country
. After
Three Mile Island
back in
1979
, as a young senator you called for a moratorium of six months on any
nuclear power
plants in the
United States
. Should that hold true now?

SEN. LEVIN:Well, I think there ought to be a period here where all of our
nuclear plants
are tested very, very carefully to make sure that they are safe, and to make sure that this cannot happen here. But I don't think that we can say that we're not going to continue to use
nuclear power
.
Europe
depends heavily on it, and they have found it to be safe. We use it a lot. We have found it, since
Three Mile Island
, to be safe. And it seems to me that the great hope that we have, ultimately, in
terms
of
greenhouse gas
is to move away from
fossil fuels
. And although I think we have to be mighty careful about
nuclear power
, we should put a lot of
effort
into seeing what we can do with the waste, that we cannot give up on that possibility because of the
climate change
which is occurring from
fossil fuels
.

MR. GREGORY:Senator
Kerry
, about 30 seconds here. How big of a blow has
nuclear power
, as part of our
energy
mix, been dealt here?

SEN. KERRY:Well, I think it's taken some hit, obviously. But I think it's going to cause everybody to look for the fail-safe methodology and what the next generation of
nuclear power
might or might not be. I think, you know, of equal urgency is simply responding to the demand of
climate change
and the need to move away from
fossil fuels
. The faster we build an
energy
grid in
America
that we move to solar, thermal, other things, I think the marketplace will make that decision for us.

MR. GREGORY:Senator
Sessions
, after the
gulf oil
spill, after the nuclear emergency in
Japan
, do you think the president is capable of leading a bipartisan
effort
to really make
energy policy
a priority, and to lead to some change?

SEN. SESSIONS:He's -- he has to do that. He has not done that. The
Energy Department
seems to be putting out more roadblocks on American
energy production
than actually leading in the way to produce more
energy
. We need more clean, American
energy
. Now, that is a
driving force
for this
country
right now. We're not seeing that
leadership
. We've got
gulf oil
production blocked basically by not getting permits. Only two have been made and, and -- since the
oil spill
.

MR. GREGORY:Right.

SEN. SESSIONS:And we need to get moving. We simply cannot afford not to.

MR. GREGORY:I'm going to have to make that the last word. Senators, thank you all very much. Coming up, after almost a decade of war, the
U.S. military
finds itself stretched thinner by yet another conflict in the
Middle East
. What ignited Saturday's decision to mobilize in
Libya
? And what are the consequences for the
U.S.
and the president's legacy? Our roundtable weighs in: president of
Council on Foreign Relations
,
Richard Haass
; former
CIA directorMichael Hayden
;
NBC
's
Andrea Mitchell
and
Jim Miklaszewski
; and
The New York Times
'
Helene Cooper
.

MR. GREGORY:And we are back, joined now by our political roundtable:
White House
correspondent for
The New York Times
,
Helene Cooper
;
NBC News
chief
foreign affairs
correspondent,
Andrea Mitchell
; former director of the
NSA
and
CIA
, and principal of the
Chertoff Group
,
Michael Hayden
; president of the
Council of Foreign Relations
,
Richard Haass
; and
NBC News
chief
Pentagon
correspondent,
Jim Miklaszewski
. Welcome to all of you. So much to get to, as this is a breaking story. I want to talk, however, about how much is on the president's plate right now. You talk about
crisis management
and a confluence of
crisis
. We've pulled together some
cover
stories from
Time magazine
-- I want to put it up there on the screen -- "
Target

Gaddafi." The next one, "Hitting Home:Tripoli
Under
Attack
." And the next one, "Meltdown." Folks, that was the spring
1986
, 25 years ago.
Andrea Mitchell
, we're back. We're covering the same issues.

MS. ANDREA MITCHELL:I was there 25 years ago, which is what's even more scary, and I was at
Three Mile Island
. When you look at the
crisis management
here, questions are being raised about how quickly -- as you heard, Senator
Sessions
raise that question --
and I
don't think that's just politics here because there are legitimate questions that international allies as well are asking about why not sooner when the
rebels
were ascendant. Because now you really have a
situation
where they will deny it because they don't have the legal authority for it, but this is
regime change
. There is no other option here.

MR. GREGORY:And I
, and I want to get more into that, but I want to just say, 25 years ago,
Richard Haass
,
Chernobyl
was the meltdown in that
Time magazinecover
. But again, confluence of
crisis
. For any president, this is a lot to manage at one time.

MR. RICHARD HAASS:It's a lot to manage, but also it raises the importance of an
administration
having its priorities. You've got a lot to manage with
Japan
, you've got a lot to manage with what's going on in the broader
Middle East
, you've got a lot to manage what's going on in the
United States
in
terms
of our economy and our deficit. So one of the real questions is why are we doing as much are we are doing in
Libya
? So many of your guests are talking about
too little too late
. Let me give you another idea,
David
, too much too late. In times of
crisis
and multiple
crisis
, administrations have to figure out their priorities. They got to do some triage. The -- to me, the big problem is not what we haven't done, it
is what we are
doing.

MR. GREGORY:And,
Helene Cooper
, as I played for the senators,
President Obama
was
clear
on this, he wants
Gadhafi
to go. And yet you heard from Admiral
Mullen
and Senator
Kerry
saying, "Well, that's not the
mission
here." And
Andrea
just alluded to it.

MS. HELENE COOPER:There's been so much ambivalence in the
administration
in -- on
Libya
, and that's because, because at, at its heart the
administration
really doesn't want to do this.
The Pentagon
certainly doesn't want to be at war in
Libya
. They've been saying for
weeksLibya
is not a
national security
interest, we should be worried about what's going on in
Saudi Arabia
and
Bahrain
. There are far greater American
national security
interests going on, particularly when you look at what's happening throughout the
region
.
Libya
is just not -- and which is why I think you see this sort of -- the appearance of a completely inconsistent policy.
President Obama
himself, in announcing that we were going to be doing
military
strikes, was very -- said at the same time that he says we're going to war, says it's not going to be long, it's only going to be a few, you know, days, not
weeks
. You know, you, you, you definitely get this sort of push-pull type of feeling, which I think is...

MR. TIM RUSSERT:And what, in your mind, would define a great president?

SEN. BARACK OBAMA:Obviously, most of the time it seems that the president has maybe 10 percent of his agenda set by himself and 90 percent of it set by circumstances.

MR. GREGORY:Well, we're living firmly in the 90 percent, and yet
leadership
tests here, how he'll be defined, are very much by these tests.

MR. JIM MIKLASZEWSKI:And to follow up a little bit on what
Helene
said, both Secretary
Gates
at the
Pentagon
and Admiral
Mike Mullen
, the chairman of the
Joint Chiefs
, gave
President Obama
an escape hatch when it came to
Libya
. When just two
weeks
ago Secretary
Gates
warned that to launch any kind of
air strikes
, impose a no-fly zone had unintended consequences of a second and third order.
David
, we haven't even seen the first order of consequences yet that probably lie ahead.

MR. GREGORY:General Hayden
, what are your concerns and your thoughts right now as you're watching this unfold?

GEN. MICHAEL HAYDEN (Retired):Well, I, I think what the folks that I used to serve with in the
armed forces
in the
intelligence community
are, are wondering is, "How do I know when I'm done? What, what, what constitutes accomplishing this
mission
?" I mean, we can say this is for
humanitarian
purposes, we can say it's a no-fly zone; but, in reality, what we have done is intervene in a Libyan
civil war
. We now own a moral responsibility for the outcome.

MR. GREGORY:And,
Andrea
, to your point, you think part of that outcome is not to rest until
Gadhafi
's gone.

MS. MITCHELL:He -- they cannot let this continue. They're can't have
Gadhafi
in charge as the outcome of this. Now we are committed, and it's very
clear
from the people I'm talking to inside the
administration
that they expect that either his own people will get him or there will be some other way of getting him. Either we get him or they get him, but he is going to be ousted. Then the question becomes one that Secretary
Clinton

raised when she was a skeptic initially about this:Whom are we dealing with? Who are these
rebels
? What kind of vacuum have we created? This has some analogy to what happened when we disbanded the
Ba'ath
army. And if
Gadhafi
is now arming everyone, you're going to have
street fighting
, hand-to-hand combat in
Libya
.

MR. GREGORY:Richard
, you, you just have broad concerns as you, as you penned a piece in the
Wall Street Journal
earlier this month, "
The US
should keep out of
Libya
."

MR. HAASS:Again, our interests aren't vital. We're talking about 2 percent of the
world
's oil. Yes, there's a
humanitariansituation
on, but at the risk of seeming a bit cold, it is not a
humanitarian crisis
on the scale say of
Rwanda
. We don't have nearly 100 -- a million people, innocent men, women and children whose lives are threatened. This is something much more modest. This is a
civil war
. In
civil wars
, people get killed, unfortunately. But we shouldn't kid ourselves. This is not a
humanitarian intervention
, this is
U.S.
political,
military intervention
in a civil conflict which, by the way, history suggests, often prolongs the civil conflict. And, as several people have already pointed out, what is step B? Whether
Gadhafi
complies with what we want or whether he resists successfully,
either way
, we are going to be stuck with the aftermath of essentially having to take ownership of
Libya
with others. And just because others are willing to share in something, as so many people point out, doesn't make it a better policy. It just means the costs are going to be distributed. But the policy itself is seriously flawed.

MR. GREGORY:There are some of these
big questions
.
Helene
, the piece that you broke ground with in the
Times
yesterday -- we'll put the headline up on the screen -- in
terms
of the secretary of
state
-- not the
LA Times
but the
New York Times
-- talking about Secretary of State's
Clinton
's role really driving this. What changed here internally? There's the headline. "Shift by
Clinton Helped Persuade President
to Take a
Harder Line
."

MS. COOPER:I think there are a number of factors, but it was such an interesting debate. And
Richard
brings up
Rwanda
. I think actually
Rwanda
did have something to do with it because you had Secretary
Clinton
, who was first lady during the
Rwanda genocide
and whose husband has said that not intervening is one of his biggest regrets; you have
Susan Rice
, who was the African adviser at the time who also was -- had a lot of
Rwanda
history there; and you had this sort of barely unlikely combination alliance between the two, along with
Samantha Power
who -- top
human rights
advocate; and it's sort of, in a lot of ways, is sort of the girls took on the guys.

MR. GREGORY:Hm.

MS. COOPER:You had
Gateson the other hand
in the
Pentagon
saying, "Look, we've got..."

MR. GREGORY:And
Mullen
. I mean...

MS. COOPER:Right, and
Mullen
. You could see...

MR. GREGORY:...you could really see that reluctance today.

MS. COOPER:...you could see from the interview with
Mullen
how much that, you know, and -- but they, you know, once the
Arab League
over the weekend sort of swung behind. There have been so many things nobody expected with the
Libya
case. Nobody thought the
Arab League
would, would come behind and say, "Yes, we want a no-fly zone as well." Once the
Arab League
did, you know, and these -- the
Obamaadministration
was faced with this specter of possibly seeing on
TV
the slaughter in
Benghazi
.
Hillary Clinton
got, during a meeting in
Paris
, in a
Paris
hotel room on Tuesday met with the
UAE
leader, and, and he agreed to pledge
Arab
troops and
Arab
,
Arab
fighter pilots to the cause. And, at that point, she sort of flipped over, and that started the, the switch for
Obama
. But he still doesn't seem to be -- his heart doesn't seem to be really in it.

MS. MITCHELL:And I
think, as
Helene
has reported,
Clinton
was driving this because of what she was hearing from the allies as well.
Susan Rice
did a remarkable job at the
U.N. No
one could have predicted -- even critics of the policy could not predict such a muscular resolution being approved and the abstentions from
Russia
and
China
. This came much faster than anyone expected, and it came with a -- some very adept diplomacy.

MR. GREGORY:Well, and
General Hayden
, you said that this notion of a no-fly zone is -- how do you describe it? Should not be the focus.

GEN. HAYDEN:Right, right. No. I mean, look, it wasn't the
Libyan air force
that was causing problems. It was the preponderance of ground power that
Gadhafi
could bring to bear. And so stopping them flying doesn't solve anything.

MR. GREGORY:No. It's so we can bomb them from their airspace, right? If they start to move on the ground.

GEN. HAYDEN:We have -- we have to do. But I found it striking that your reporter from
Tobruk
said that the reaction of the opposition to this was they're putting their helmets back on, buttoning their chin straps...

MR. GREGORY:Yeah.

GEN. HAYDEN:...and going back on the offensive. Now, what kind of dilemma policywise does that present us with if now it's the opposition on the move taking on
Gadhafi
's forces?

MR. GREGORY:All right. Now I want to get a quick break in here. We're going to come back and talk about this and some of the bigger questions about what comes next. More with our roundtable as the
situation
in
Libya
unfolds right after this.

MR. GREGORY:We're back.
Richard Haass
, let me pick up with you. The issue that was on the table is, what if now the opposition feels emboldened, and they're now on the move, and
civil war
starts again? What position does that put us in?

MR. HAASS:Well, that's exactly what's going to happen.

MR. GREGORY:Yeah.

MR. HAASS:And we don't know what the
political agenda
of these people are. The tribal makeup of
Libya
is so complex. I hope that the people making the decisions in the
administration
have a real feel for what is going on and what are going to be the political agendas of the people we may be now empowering. But the one thing we know is that this thing now has a new lease on life. And what might have burned out is not going to, if you will, be rekindled. This is now going to be a prolonged
civil war
. And at some point we're going to have to decide new forms of intervention. It's not going to stop here,
David
. It's not going to end with simply the
United States
shooting off some
Tomahawks
or doing some
aircraft
runs. This is going to require, ultimately, the one thing the
administration
says it probably doesn't want to do,
boots on the ground
. Someone is going to have to provide that kind of involvement in
Libya
because this is a
country
that is going to be fundamentally divided with places people are killing each other and places the
government
is not in control of.

MR. GREGORY:Jim Miklaszewski
, see
Iraq
, see
Afghanistan
, eight years and 10 years respectively. In
Iraq
, this was supposed to be in, greeted like liberators, and we were going to leave.

MR. MIKLASZEWSKI:As
Yogi Berra
would say, "
Deja vu all over again
." And to tear down a couple of facades very quickly, one, that this about a no-fly zone. It's not. As a matter of fact,
U.S. Air Force F-15s
and
F-16s
today were over
Libya
with the express purpose of attacking Libyan
ground forces
, which they did. And yesterday, Admiral
Gortney
said, you know, this is all about protecting civilians and the opposition forces, which gets us into the middle of that
civil war
that
Richard
was just talking about. And finally, this premise that this is a
coalitioneffort
, right now it's all
U.S. It
's
U.S.
commanded,
U.S.
led,
U.S. military
. And when Admiral
Mullen
was talking about handing over command of the
coalition
, I was told, number one, well, "We're really not in any hurry to do that." And number two, it could be an American commander.

MR. GREGORY:But,
Jim
, is that fair? I mean,
General Hayden
, I had a member of the
Bush administration
say to me candidly, look, can you imagine if
Sarkozy
was in power in
2002
as we were starting the
Iraq War
. You really do have the French and the British leading on this. As the senator has pointed out, the
Arab League
swinging behind this here. It'd be difficult,
Gadhafi
may try, but to make this a unilateral
U.S.effort
here.

GEN. HAYDEN:Oh, no. and I, I don't think anyone's saying that we should. But let's look at why people are doing these things. I think the
Arab League
move was quite remarkable, frankly. But with our
European friends
, I mean, this is about cold, hard facts. This is about mass migration. They, they have a direct interest here that they have to protect. It's no wonder that they had a greater sense of urgency about this than we did.

MR. GREGORY:Helene
, the -- one of the questions that I look at, you look at what's happening throughout the
Middle East
, revolution throughout the
Middle East
, and for this president, for this
administration
, you have to ask, what are the
big ideas
and are we getting the
big ideas
right?

MS. COOPER:It's -- that's such a great question, and people are always raising the issue who, who are the strategic thinkers within this
administration
.
And I
think, you know, when -- and when people ask the question of who actually drives
American foreign policy
in the
administration
,
at the end of the day
, it's
Obama
. And that, I think, is, is sort of really interesting. But they are in such a weird position right now because you're seeing this inconsistency. We're going after
Gadhafi
, but we're not doing it in
Bahrain
. You see what happened, how long it took in
Egypt
, and we're very quick in
Tunisia
, and then
Yemen
, and you've got, you know, what -- we're -- we have a lot of counterterrorism concerns in
Yemen
as well. One of the really interesting debates that came forward through -- during -- on the
Libya
front was when
John Brennan
,
President Obama
's
terrorism
adviser, raised the issue of the fact that a lot of these Libyan
rebels
have ties to
al-Qaeda
.
Al-Qaeda
and the
Maghreb
put out a statement on Thursday saying that they were with the Libyan opposition.

MR. GREGORY:Right.

MS. COOPER:So there's so much...

MR. GREGORY:The
big ideas
and are we getting them right?

MR. HAASS:Mike Mullen
says the
big idea
, the biggest single
national security
threat facing the
United States
is our economy, it's our fiscal
situation
. This will not make it better. Instead, we are ignoring a previous secretary of
state
,
John Quincy Adams
, someone you haven't had on the show in awhile. We are going abroad in search of monsters to destroy. There's any number of monsters. But is this, right now, something that's strategically necessary and vital for the
United States
, given all that's happening in places like
Egypt
,
Bahrain
,
Saudi Arabia
, around the
world
, with all that we need to repair at home? The answer, I would think, is not. And that's the
big idea
the
administration
's missing. It's not enough to simply want to do good around the
world
wherever we see bad. We've got to ask ourselves, where can we do good, at what cost, against what else we might have to do?

MR. GREGORY:And,
Andrea
, I mean, it's values vs. interests.

MS. MITCHELL:The problem that the president has in projecting
American values
is that he first of all believes in a multilaterous policy. Now, on that score, he has, he has really accomplished that. This was pretty remarkable bringing this whole
coalition
together and getting the
Arab League
. But the problem of American interests is not really resolved because our interests really, as has been said, lies in
Bahrain
and
Saudi Arabia
. And there is the conflict that I think we're about to face. In
Bahrain
, it's already in the streets;
Saudia Arabia
repressed, but -- and paid off by
economic interests
domestically. But that is the
crisis
. You're going to have
leadership
changes there with the aging
leadership
sooner rather than later.

MR. GREGORY:Right.

MS. MITCHELL:And concern that what's happening in
Libya
could also destabilize
Egypt
and
Tunisia
and whatever gains are being made.

MR. GREGORY:And where is
President Obama
this weekend? He is in
South America
. We have pictures of him arriving in
Brazil
. There's been a lot of question,
Jim Miklaszewski
, about the president's
leadership
, passivity in the face of
Japan
or
Libya
. Perhaps in that latter case that's been erased, given what he's ordered here. But here he is riding out this initial weekend in
Brazil
. He wasn't even the one to announce the beginning of hostilities.

MR. MIKLASZEWSKI:Well, it's
clear
the
White House
has tried to distance itself from being at the center or in the lead of the political surge and diplomatic surge to send
U.S. forces
and a
coalition
into
Libya
. But I can tell you that, in all the discussions with senior
U.S. military
and
Pentagon
officials, they say that
President Obama
is very engaged. And his first inclination appeared to follow the advice of the
SecDef Gates
and Admiral
Mullen
to stay out of
Libya
.

MR. GREGORY:Bad idea, bad idea for him to be away, though, to be out of the
country
with this.

MS. MITCHELL:I think there's a lot to be said for not, not insulting the entire
region
with
China
advancing its
economic interests
in
Latin America
. But I think they could have found a better way for him to announce it rather than being trapped in a joint statement with the
Brazilian president
and, and not
really saying something
aggressive.

MR. GREGORY:All right. We're going to leave it there. We'll continue to follow all of this.
Thank you very much
. Before we go, a quick programming note. Stay with
NBC
and
MSNBC
throughout the day for continuing coverage of the conflict in
Libya
. Our rebroadcast, we should point out, on
MSNBC
, airs at
2 PM
and
5 PM
Eastern today. That is all for today. We'll be back next week. If it's Sunday, it's
MEET THE

MR. DAVID GREGORY: This Sunday, breaking news: Attack on Libya. U.S.,French and British forces target Libyan air defenses in support of rebels fighting to overthrow Libyan ruler Moammar Khaddafy. President Obama insisted the attack only followed Khaddafy's refusal to end his assault as the United Nations resolution demanded.

(Videotape)

PRES. BARACK OBAMA: We are answering the calls of a threatened people, end we are acting in the interests of the United States and the world.

SEC'Y HILLARY CLINTON: We have every reason to fear that left unchecked, Khaddafy will commit unspeakable atrocities.

MR. GREGORY: This morning, the very latest on the military campaign, its goal and its limits, including the president's order that no U.S. ground troops be committed. With us, the president's top military adviser, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen.

Then, reaction from Capitol Hill. Is Libya a threat to the United States? Is it too late for military action to make a difference? And should the president have sought congressional authority? With us, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator Carl Levin of
Michigan; chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts; and Republican member of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama.

Finally, our roundtable assesses the president's leadership as he manages a crisis in the Middle East and confronts the still unfolding dangers from Japan's nuclear emergency. With us, NBC News chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell, NBC News chief Pentagon correspondent Jim Miklaszewski, White House correspondent for The New York Times Helene
Cooper, former director of the CIA General Michael Hayden, and president of the Council of Foreign Relations Richard Haass.

MR. DAVID GREGORY: Libyan leader Moammar Khaddafy took to the airwaves this morning vowing to stay and fight, and calling the airstrikes on his country tantamount to terrorism. Anti-aircraft fire painted the skies over Tripoli overnight after allied forces launched Operation Odyssey Dawn to prop up rebel forces against the Khaddafy government. Earlier in
the day the French took the lead as their war planes patrolled the skies over Libya and struck pro-Khaddafy tanks. U.S. and British forces followed by launching a volley of more than 100 cruise missiles and heavy bombing during strikes that targeted Libyan air defenses and communications facilities. The U.S. currently has at least 11 naval vessels in the Mediterranean in addition to surveillance aircraft. All of this in preparation to impose a U.N.-sanctioned no-fly zone. It is the largest military intervention since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, eight years to the day.

Richard, you have been traveling from Egypt through eastern Libya. Tell me what you've been seeing and experiencing.

RICHARD ENGEL reporting:

The roads are remarkably calm, people are out on the streets. I spoke with rebels just a short while ago. They say that finally this action has taken place, and they hope that they can get some more momentum again. I was here in this area about a week ago when the tide of events seemed to be turning against the rebels, and you didn't see them out much, they were abandoning their checkpoints. Now, once again, their checkpoints are out, and they were painting anti-Khaddafy graffiti, once again openly, on some of the buildings. So they feel that they have a renewed sense of optimism, and they hope to regain the momentum in this fight.

MR. GREGORY: Too little, too late is a question you keep hearing, Richard. I've heard your reporting on this. They had momentum a couple of weeks ago.

ENGEL: They certainly did. And the rebels are asking why didn't this come even a few days ago, before the, the major push into Benghazi--which appears to have been repulsed--actually took place at all. They had momentum right when they, when they began, and as soon as they left Benghazi they, they found themselves being crushed from the air. An air cover, an air cap over eastern Libya will give the rebels time to group, they say, time to take care of some of their wounded and perhaps learn from some of the mistakes that they made in the early days and try and advance with a little bit more skill and patience than they certainly exhibited in the, in the last time they tried to march toward Libya, which was really just wild firing in the air...

MR. GREGORY: Right.

ENGEL: ...and a completely uncoordinated effort.

MR. GREGORY: Richard, finally, based on your experience in the region and your reporting, what is Khaddafy up to?

ENGEL: Khaddafy seems to be laying the ground for an insurgency. He said today that he will give out today a million weapons to men and women mostly around Tripoli. He announced today that he will be opening the armory for all Libyans who want to fight to defend their country. And he said today that there will be a long war for Libya. So he seems to be
preparing for allowing his people to fight and to drag the West and drag the rebels here in the east into some sort of war of attrition.

MR. GREGORY: Just quickly, though, is there any sense that he's feeling more pressure than he has in the past that somebody around him might kill him, or that he might decide to step down?

ENGEL: The one indication that he might be feeling physical pressure is that he has invited hundreds of supporters to live in presidential compounds, effectively as human shields. That is something that the U.S. is clearly going to be concerned about, and there have been people
volunteering to go to sites that could be attacked by American or other Western missiles or air power. So that is--could be an indication that he is nervous.

MR. DAVID GREGORY: Joining me now, the president's top military adviser, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen.

Welcome back to MEET THE PRESS.

ADM. MIKE MULLEN: Good morning, David.

MR. GREGORY: Admiral, are we at war with Libya?

ADM. MULLEN: We are--actually started yesterday limited operation and, and narrow in scope focused on supporting the United Nations Security Council resolution which very specifically focused on humanitarian efforts protecting the civilians in Libya. And I'd also say that
operations yesterday went, went very well. Certainly, the, the--in, in putting in place a no-fly zone, which is what we're, what we're doing right now. And, effectively, he hasn't had any aircraft or helicopters fly in the last couple days. So effectively that no-fly zone has, has been put in place.

MR. GREGORY: But just to speak plainly about it, as you've said, any no-fly zone begins with an act of war. This is war against Libya.

ADM. MULLEN: Well, what we did, certainly, is we took out his, his radars, his ability to, to, for the most part, attack us from the ground, and that's how you start to set up a no-fly zone. Again, it's very focused on ensuring that he can't execute--continue to execute his own
people. And we don't see any indications of any kind of large-scale massacre at this particular point in time.

MR. GREGORY: Let's look at the map here and talk about both the geography and some of the strikes. These are, according to the Defense Department, where some of the strikes are. Obviously Tripoli, which is where Khaddafy is. In Benghazi you don't see any strike points on that particular map. We know from our reporting out of our own folks at the Pentagon that B-2 bombers were deployed, dropping some 40 bombs against air defense systems within Libya. What is the concentration in Tripoli vs. Benghazi?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, I think as you look at that, most of those targets were part of his air defense system. And we also hit some of his airfields--again, these--this--these are almost--they're prerequisites for establishing a no-fly zone. And then we put combat air patrol, CAP,
up above in various places, and we've got a--we've got--them aircraft stationed above Benghazi right now on a 24/7 basis. And then what, what we'll see do--what we'll do is we'll move that, that capping capability, those aircraft, over time further to the west. But most of those strikes took out his air defenses and hit his airfields.

MR. GREGORY: Is there more to be done to limit his capacity to either attack planes or to attack rebels?

ADM. MULLEN: Some of the engagements yesterday included attacking his forces on the ground in the vicinity of Benghazi, and clearly the objective will be to, to attack those forces and ensure they are unable to continue to attack the innocent civilians, which he was doing as
recently as yesterday morning in Benghazi.

MR. GREGORY: What about civilian casualties? Libyan TV, as you might expect...

ADM. MULLEN: Sure.

MR. GREGORY: ...has said there have been civilians hit.

ADM. MULLEN: Sure.

MR. GREGORY: Have we--can we confirm that?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, all of these targets were looked at in terms of absolutely minimizing collateral damage. And the reports I've seen have indicated minimum collateral damage. I haven't seen any reports of civilian, civilian casualties. And I think, true to form, what Khaddafy has done is--has put in place both human shields in some cases, as well as created or, or said that we have generated civilian casualties. I just haven't seen it.

MR. GREGORY: What else do you expect him to do in the coming hours and days? There is a stockpile believed to be a mustard gas. He's talked about lashing out using terrorism against Western interests. What do you expect?

ADM. MULLEN: We've focused very heavily on, on the chemical capability that he has and don't see any indication that that's--that he's moving on that. We, we've been focused on that for days. This is the--yesterday and, and today is the first phase of a multi-phase operation, but what we expect is him to stay down, not fly his aircraft, not attack his own
people and to allow the humanitarian efforts, which is such a significant part of the United Nations resolution, to take place.

MR. GREGORY: The goal, as the president has stated it, is to protect civilians. But he's also made it very clear that Khaddafy has to go. How, with this kind of limited military operation, can you achieve that goal?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, in the next few days, David--first of all, I would expect us to pass the leadership of the military operation to be led by those in the coalition, and that the United States, in particular, would support with unique capabilities, which could include jamming,
intelligence support, the kinds of things that--tanker support for the aircraft, those kinds of things. And then to support the kind of humanitarian effort that I talked about. And then I think over time, obviously, Colonel Khaddafy's going to have to--he's going to have to make some decisions. Clearly, there's been significant international isolation, significant sanctions, an arms embargo, an off--and, and a very broad coalition internationally to isolate him. And I think he's going to have to make some choices about his own future at that point.

MR. GREGORY: But I mean, you know, we may have--maybe we had a lot of faith in him making the right choices since we've been after him for decades. He hasn't done that. Do we have it in our interest and in our plans to go get him?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, I--certainly, we've looked at, as we prepared for this, all kinds of options. The president's been very clear that we're not going to put any boots on the ground. This isn't about occupation in any way, shape or form.

MR. GREGORY: But what if doesn't work? What if the goal of preventing civilian death, or the goal of getting him out of power doesn't work? Why put that limit in place?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, I think certainly the no-fly zone will allow us to continue to both attack and monitor his forces. And, at least initially, it looks like it's had a positive impact in terms of preventing further civilian casualties. And, and then I think that what happens next in speculating about that is there's uncertainty associated with that. The whole idea's to put as much pressure on this guy so he doesn't continue to kill his own people, and isolate him internationally, which he is, I believe, more than he has ever been.

MR. GREGORY: But isn't it a legitimate--it's not just a diplomatic question, it's a military question. If the goals do not prevent Khaddafy from going, what do we do? There's the prospect of Khaddafy holed up in Tripoli, a divided Libya. This is not a sustainable strategy.

ADM. MULLEN: This is--certainly the goals of this campaign right now again are limited, and it isn't, it isn't about seeing him go. It's about supporting the United Nations resolution, which talked to limiting or eliminating the--his ability to kill his own people, as well as support the humanitarian effort.

MR. GREGORY: So the mission can be accomplished and Khaddafy can remain in power?

ADM. MULLEN: It's--I think the president's made it very clear that our national interests are tied to a country that is so close to us in the Mediterranean, that borders Egypt and Tunisia, two countries that are also undergoing significant change as we speak, and clearly, the focus on the humanitarian piece in terms of someone who has massacred his people in the past and preventing that. In that regard, it is.

MR. GREGORY: But there are also questions about the double standard here. Why do we make a move on Libya, and yet in Bahrain, where Saudis send troops in to help a monarchy, we stand back?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, again, this mission is very focused on Libya, and we're paying a lot of attention to what's going on in Bahrain and in the Persian Gulf as well. And the other thing is, each one of these countries, I think, is different. We've tried to focus on it in a different way. We've had a great friendship with Bahrain for, for many, many decades. We've got one of our main naval base--bases are there. And we're working hard to support that, in a way, to certainly see a peaceful outcome there in terms of how it evolves when the Bahraini people are asking for change as well.

MR. GREGORY: Is it possible that it's too late to really make a difference here? Had a no-fly zone been implemented a couple of weeks ago when the rebels had more momentum that that would have been the time to act and now it's too late?

ADM. MULLEN: Oh, I think that's speculation, David. I just--I, I don't know that going two weeks ago would have turned this one way or another. Essentially, I think it was important to have the international sanctioning, the United Nations resolution and, and the coalition, a broad coalition which both condemns him and actually acts against him in terms of implementing the specifics of the no-fly zone.

MR. GREGORY: How long will this go on?

ADM. MULLEN: I--it's hard to say how long it will go on. I actually--I mean, over the last 24 hours there's been a significant amount of progress. As I said, effectively the no-fly zone has been put in place. We have halted him in the vicinity of Benghazi, which is where he was
most recently on the march. And then it's hard to say what'll happen in the next few days or weeks.

MR. GREGORY: And what happens if Khaddafy goes? Are we prepared to see the rebels put forward a leader for that country?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, I've--we've actually been in touch with the opposition in terms of understanding what they want, but I think there's certainly a lot of work to do to, to look at what the next steps would be with respect to what will happen in that country, and that would
principally be left up to the people in Libya.

MR. GREGORY: A third war in a Muslim country, eight years after the invasion of Iraq, is this simply too much for the United States to take on?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, certainly, I'm very much aware of, of the, the significant steps we've taken and that this is a, certainly, another--an additional fight. That said, we're more than capable of meeting the needs. Again, this is a, this is a limited, narrowly scoped mission, and we have the capability and capacity and, as has been the case for so long, we've got great, great people, and they've executed exceptionally well.

ADM. MULLEN: No. None whatsoever. None whatsoever. I mean, the president has said this is a mission to carry out, and we are, in fact, executing it and we can do that within the--you know, within even the, the, the challenges and stress that are presented broadly across the
force.

MR. GREGORY: Is it possible that the United States will take a backseat in this effort very quickly?

ADM. MULLEN: Well, they're--we're looking to, while leading it now, we're looking to hand off that leadership in the next few days. This is a military operation, so that's got to be done smoothly. There's a coalition which has come together, a commitment to a coalition lead with respect to this, and we would expect that to happen in the near future. And then we will provide the kind of support and unique capabilities that I spoke to earlier.

MR. GREGORY: Admiral Mullen, we'll be following it all closely. Thank you very much.

ADM. MULLEN: Thank you, David.

MR. GREGORY: And coming up, our special coverage of Libya continues. The view from Capitol Hill. We'll talk to the top foreign policymakers in the Senate, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Democratic Senator Carl Levin; chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee,
Democratic Senator John Kerry; and Republican member of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Jeff Sessions.

(Announcements)

MR. GREGORY: Coming up, reaction from Capitol Hill on the U.S. strike in Libya. Senators Kerry, Levin and Sessions join me, up next, right after this brief commercial break.

(Announcements)

MR. DAVID GREGORY: We are back, our special Libya coverage, joined now by the top foreign policymakers in the Senate. From Cairo, the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, Democrat Senator John Kerry; chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Democrat Carl Levin of Michigan; and Republican members of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Jeff
Sessions.

In terms of the end game here, Senators, President Obama earlier this month couldn't have been more clear in terms of what he wanted to happen to Colonel Khaddafy. Listen.

(Videotape, March 3, 2011)

PRES. BARACK OBAMA: Let me just be very unambiguous about this. Colonel Khaddafy needs to step down from power and leave.

(End videotape)

MR. GREGORY: And yet, Senator Kerry, I want to hear from all of you in terms of reacting to this. You heard from Admiral Mullen this morning that, in fact, Khaddafy could remain in power and this military mission could still be seen as a success. Do you agree with that?

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA): Well, the goal of this mission, David, is not to get rid of Khaddafy, and that's not what the United Nations licensed. And I would not call it going to war. This is a very limited operation that is geared to save lives, and it was specifically targeted on a
humanitarian basis. It is not geared to try to get rid of Khaddafy. He has not been targeted. That is not what is happening here. So, in my judgment, we have to see where we go from here. Remember, in Kosovo after the initial efforts, President Martti Ahtisaari of Finland and
Viktor Chernomyrdin of the Soviet Union came and were--Russia were involved immediately in diplomacy, and he ultimately was persuaded to do things. I think there's a lot of room here for a lot of different initiatives. But this operation was not specifically geared to get rid of Khaddafy.

MR. GREGORY: Well, Senator Levin, is that the right outcome? Again, the president couldn't have been any more clear about what he wants to have happen, and yet he's launched a military operation without that goal?

SEN. CARL LEVIN (D-MI): He has a military operation with very clear mission, and that's what the president should do is have a clear mission and to avoid mission creep. And one of the things that I know our military are very--were very concerned about was that there could be
mission creep. They don't have that concern anymore because this mission has been very carefully limited. After a few days there's going to be a handoff. After the air is cleared of any threats, there's going to be a handoff to our allies, and this mission will then be carried on by
French, by British, and by Arab countries. And that's very important. One of the reasons I predict that there will be strong bipartisan support in the Congress for the president's decision is because it is a limited mission, no boots on the ground, and because he has done this with great caution, with great care. And I saw that in person in the White House on Friday and was very impressed...

MR. GREGORY: Well...

SEN. LEVIN: ...by the caution and the care that the president is putting into this.

MR. GREGORY: Senator Sessions, as a Republican, do you support what the president's done, specifically some of the limits he's placed on no U.S. ground forces being committed?

SEN. JEFF SESSIONS (R-AL): I'm supportive of that at this point. And I do think, however, the no-fly zone, as it's being executed, has proven Senator Kerry and Senator McCain in their call for a no-fly zone correct. They did that several weeks ago. And certainly, had it been done several weeks ago, we'd be in better shape than we are today. So the fact that it has been...

MR. GREGORY: Are you actually concerned that this is too little, too late?

SEN. SESSIONS: Well, I think that's a very real concern. We could end up with the, the rebels having lost momentum and creating a prolonged stalemate in which Libya and the people of Libya are subjected to violence for months and maybe even longer than that.

MR. GREGORY: Senator...

SEN. SESSIONS: We--I can't quite see where we are heading. I can't see exactly where the endgame is, and I do think it is a troubling situation. We just hope for the best and maybe this will be successful. But I don't see the certainty of it for sure.

MR. GREGORY: Senator Kerry, to kind of synthesize some of reaction out there, it's--what are we doing? What are we doing in Libya? Your ranking member on the Foreign Relations Committee told our own chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell on her program on MSNBC a couple of weeks ago the following. I'll put it up on the screen. "Our dilemma," Senator Lugar said, "very frankly, is that we are not in a position to police each of these countries to establish governments that we believe are just for the people, and even to find partners, in some cases, who are likely to exemplify our ideals of human rights and democracy."

SEN. KERRY: Well, Senator Lugar is a wise, wise, you know, counselor on these issues, and I have nothing but enormous respect for him. But we're not policing Libya. We are engaged in a humanitarian initiative to prevent the slaughter of innocent people, to prevent a dictator from
dragging people out of hospital beds, and they disappear, and he kills them, to ruling his country by pure force when there is an indigenous movement to try to join with the rest of the countries in this Arab awakening that is taking place. And the important thing here, David, is to see this in the larger context. I think we have enormous interest here personally, the interest of making clear to Tunisians, to Egyptians, to others who are moving towards this awakening that the rest of the world is not going to stand by while people are slaughtered by somebody who has lost...

MR. GREGORY: But, Senator Kerry, I have to interrupt.

SEN. KERRY: ...all legitimacy to be able to govern. Let--yeah.

MR. GREGORY: Senator Levin, there is a double standard at work here. I mean, how do you not look at the region...

MR. GREGORY: ...and say, well, the United States did not intervene on behalf of Shiites who were being repressed by a Sunni monarchy in Bahrain when Saudis sent in troops, but we're choosing Libya to take this stand...

SEN. KERRY: Well, David...

MR. GREGORY: ...and when a lot of people think--let Senator Levin respond to this--this is a civil war that we're intervening in.

SEN. KERRY: But can I just add that I profoundly disagree with that.

SEN. LEVIN: Yeah. What you're missing, it seems to me--now, what you're missing here very, very--you're missing a lot here is that this is the world that has made a decision. This is a unique situation where the entire world has come together, including the Arab world, and has said the Khaddafy slaughter needs to be stopped. It is not just we, the United States. It's quite the opposite. One of the reasons there will be congressional support here is that the president has taken the time to put the world community together, to get the world community to say to Khaddafy, "This slaughter must stop." That is not true in those other countries, and it's a very important fact.

MR. GREGORY: OK. Senator Kerry, go ahead, make your point on this as well.

SEN. KERRY: Well, I have a couple of points to make. Number one, the president has been crystal clear about Bahrain. He has said that the violence needs to stop in Bahrain. The crown prince of Bahrain has offered to have a mediation, to have a national dialogue. And the truth is that, in Bahrain where there is a 70 percent Shia population, you have a certain amount of mischief being made by Iran and by Hezbollah, and it's simply not the same situation. But moreover, the Arab community, I mean, the Arab League, is the game changer here. They asked us to come in. The Gulf states, the GCC, asked us to come in. The opposition pleaded with the international community to help prevent this slaughter. I think it would be unconscionable in the face of the first time the Arab League and the Gulf states are turning to the world for help in order to move towards greater enfranchisement of their people for the United States to move away.

MR. GREGORY: Quickly...

SEN. KERRY: That would be a denial of everything we, we supported in Egypt, of everything we've supported in Tunisia, of everything we support every single day with respect to democracy and freedom.

MR. GREGORY: I want--Senator Sessions--I want to ask one other question on this before I want to get to some of your views on Japan and the fallout for America.

Senator Sessions, should the president have consulted and sought authorization from Congress for this action?

SEN. SESSIONS: I'm not sure he needed to have done that, but I frankly think we could have been better briefed on it. Senator Levin, I know, and I'm sure Senator McCain and Senator Kerry and, and Lugar have gotten more briefings than the average member of the Senate and House has gotten. But it is a factor that we know that the president has to be in contact with Congress. He's now out of the country, and that probably has been less than it should have been at this point.

MR. GREGORY: I want to turn to Japan, another crisis that the president is facing, and, of course, what the Japanese are dealing with. Here are some of the latest facts to emerge out of the disaster in Japan. The death toll now upwards of 8,100. Still so many missing, and the number of missing well over 12,000. Some signs of hope, though. Incredible images coming out of Japan early today from Ishinomaki as there were incredible rescues of a, of a teenager as well as an 80-year-old grandmother who was stuck inside of her house. Thankfully, though, those two people were rescued.

But, Senator Levin, the--as the nuclear emergency continues in Japan there are real questions about the future of nuclear power in this country. After Three Mile Island back in 1979, as a young senator you called for a moratorium of six months on any nuclear power plants in the United States. Should that hold true now?

SEN. LEVIN: Well, I think there ought to be a period here where all of our nuclear plants are tested very, very carefully to make sure that they are safe, and to make sure that this cannot happen here. But I don't think that we can say that we're not going to continue to use nuclear power. Europe depends heavily on it, and they have found it to be safe. We use it a lot. We have found it, since Three Mile Island, to be safe. And it seems to me that the great hope that we have, ultimately, in terms of greenhouse gas is to move away from fossil fuels. And although I think we have to be mighty careful about nuclear power, we should put a lot of effort into seeing what we can do with the waste, that we cannot give up on that possibility because of the climate change which is occurring from fossil fuels.

MR. GREGORY: Senator Kerry, about 30 seconds here. How big of a blow has nuclear power, as part of our energy mix, been dealt here?

SEN. KERRY: Well, I think it's taken some hit, obviously. But I think it's going to cause everybody to look for the fail-safe methodology and what the next generation of nuclear power might or might not be. I think, you know, of equal urgency is simply responding to the demand of climate change and the need to move away from fossil fuels. The faster we build an energy grid in America that we move to solar, thermal, other things, I think the marketplace will make that decision for us.

MR. GREGORY: Senator Sessions, after the gulf oil spill, after the nuclear emergency in Japan, do you think the president is capable of leading a bipartisan effort to really make energy policy a priority, and to lead to some change?

SEN. SESSIONS: He's--he has to do that. He has not done that. The Energy Department seems to be putting out more roadblocks on American energy production than actually leading in the way to produce more energy. We need more clean, American energy. Now, that is a driving force for this country right now. We're not seeing that leadership. We've got gulf oil production blocked basically by not getting permits. Only two have been made and, and--since the oil spill.

MR. GREGORY: Right.

SEN. SESSIONS: And we need to get moving. We simply cannot afford not to.

MR. GREGORY: I'm going to have to make that the last word. Senators, thank you all very much.

Coming up, after almost a decade of war, the U.S. military finds itself stretched thinner by yet another conflict in the Middle East. What ignited Saturday's decision to mobilize in Libya? And what are the consequences for the U.S. and the president's legacy? Our roundtable weighs in: president of Council on Foreign Relations, Richard Haass; former CIA director Michael Hayden; NBC's Andrea Mitchell and Jim Miklaszewski; and The New York Times' Helene Cooper.

(Announcements)

MR. DAVID GREGORY: And we are back, joined now by our political roundtable: White House correspondent for The New York Times, Helene Cooper; NBC News chief foreign affairs correspondent, Andrea Mitchell; former director of the NSA and CIA, and principal of the Chertoff Group, Michael Hayden; president of the Council of Foreign Relations, Richard Haass; and NBC News chief Pentagon correspondent, Jim Miklaszewski.

Welcome to all of you. So much to get to, as this is a breaking story. I want to talk, however, about how much is on the president's plate right now. You talk about crisis management and a confluence of crisis. We've pulled together some cover stories from Time magazine--I want to put it up there on the screen--"Target Gaddafi." The next one, "Hitting Home: Tripoli Under Attack." And the next one, "Meltdown."

Folks, that was the spring 1986, 25 years ago.

Andrea Mitchell, we're back. We're covering the same issues.

MS. ANDREA MITCHELL: I was there 25 years ago, which is what's even more scary, and I was at Three Mile Island. When you look at the crisis management here, questions are being raised about how quickly--as you heard, Senator Sessions raise that question--and I don't think that's just politics here because there are legitimate questions that
international allies as well are asking about why not sooner when the rebels were ascendant. Because now you really have a situation where they will deny it because they don't have the legal authority for it, but this is regime change. There is no other option here.

MR. GREGORY: And I, and I want to get more into that, but I want to just say, 25 years ago, Richard Haass, Chernobyl was the meltdown in that Time magazine cover. But again, onfluence of crisis. For any president, this is a lot to manage at one time.

MR. RICHARD HAASS: It's a lot to manage, but also it raises the importance of an administration having its priorities. You've got a lot to manage with Japan, you've got a lot to manage with what's going on in the broader Middle East, you've got a lot to manage what's going on in the United States in terms of our economy and our deficit. So one of the real questions is why are we doing as much are we are doing in Libya? So many of your guests are talking about too little too late. Let me give you another idea, David, too much too late. In times of crisis and multiple crisis, administrations have to figure out their priorities.
They got to do some triage. The--to me, the big problem is not what we haven't done, it is what we are doing.

MR. GREGORY: And, Helene Cooper, as I played for the senators, President Obama was clear on this, he wants Khaddafy to go. And yet you heard from Admiral Mullen and Senator Kerry saying, "Well, that's not the mission here." And Andrea just alluded to it.

MS. HELENE COOPER: There's been so much ambivalence in the administration in--on Libya, and that's because, because at, at its heart the administration really doesn't want to do this. The Pentagon certainly doesn't want to be at war in Libya. They've been saying for
weeks Libya is not a national security interest, we should be worried about what's going on in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. There are far greater American national security interests going on, particularly when you look at what's happening throughout the region. Libya is just not--and which is why I think you see this sort of--the appearance of a completely inconsistent policy. President Obama himself, in announcing that we were going to be doing military strikes, was very--said at the same time that he says we're going to war, says it's not going to be long, it's only going to be a few, you know, days, not weeks. You know, you, you, you definitely get this sort of push-pull type of feeling, which I think is...

MR. TIM RUSSERT: And what would, in your mind, define a great president?

SEN. BARACK OBAMA: Obviously, most of the time it seems that the president has maybe 10 percent of his agenda set by himself and 90 percent of it set by circumstances.

(End videotape)

MR. GREGORY: Well, we're living firmly in the 90 percent, and yet leadership tests here, how he'll be defined, are very much by these tests.

MR. JIM MIKLASZEWSKI: And to follow up a little bit on what Helene said, both Secretary Gates at the Pentagon and Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, gave President Obama an escape hatch when it came to Libya. When just two weeks ago Secretary Gates warned that to launch any kind of air strikes, impose a no-fly zone had unintended consequences of a second and third order. David, we haven't even seen the first order of consequences yet that probably lie ahead.

MR. GREGORY: General Hayden, what are your concerns and your thoughts right now as you're watching this unfold?

GEN. MICHAEL HAYDEN (Retired): Well, I, I think what the folks that I used to serve with in the armed forces in the intelligence community are, are wondering is, "How do I know when I'm done? What, what, what constitutes accomplishing this mission?" I mean, we can say this is for humanitarian purposes, we can say it's a no-fly zone; but, in reality, what we have done is intervene in a Libyan civil war. We now own a moral responsibility for the outcome.

MR. GREGORY: And, Andrea, to your point, you think part of that outcome is not to rest until Khaddafy's gone.

MS. MITCHELL: He--they cannot let this continue. They're can't have Khaddafy in charge as the outcome of this. Now we are committed, and it's very clear from the people I'm talking to inside the administration that they expect that either his own people will get him or there will be some other way of getting him. Either we get him or they get him, but he is going to be ousted. Then the question becomes one that Secretary Clinton raised when she was a skeptic initially about this: Whom are we dealing with? Who are these rebels? What kind of vacuum have we created? This has some analogy to what happened when we disbanded the Ba'ath army. And if Khaddafy is now arming everyone, you're going to have street fighting, hand-to-hand combat in Libya.

MR. GREGORY: Richard, you, you just have broad concerns as you, as you penned a piece in the Wall Street Journal earlier this month, "The US should keep out of Libya."

MR. HAASS: Again, our interests aren't vital. We're talking about 2 percent of the world's oil. Yes, there's a humanitarian situation on, but at the risk of seeming a bit cold, it is not a humanitarian crisis on the scale say of Rwanda. We don't have nearly 100--a million people,
innocent men, women and children whose lives are threatened. This is something much more modest. This is a civil war. In civil wars, people get killed, unfortunately. But we shouldn't kid ourselves. This is not a humanitarian intervention, this is U.S. political, military
intervention in a civil conflict which, by the way, history suggests, often prolongs the civil conflict. And, as several people have already pointed out, what is step B? Whether Khaddafy complies with what we want or whether he resists successfully, either way, we are going to be stuck with the aftermath of essentially having to take ownership of Libya with others. And just because others are willing to share in something, as so many people point out, doesn't make it a better policy. It just means the costs are going to be distributed. But the policy itself is
seriously flawed.

MR. GREGORY: There are some of these big questions. Helene, the piece that you broke ground with in the Times yesterday--we'll put the headline up on the screen--in terms of the secretary of state--not the LA Times but the New York Times--talking about Secretary of State's Clinton's role really driving this. What changed here internally? There's the headline. "Shift by Clinton Helped Persuade President to Take a Harder Line."

MS. COOPER: I think there are a number of factors, but it was such an interesting debate. And Richard brings up Rwanda. I think actually Rwanda did have something to do with it because you had Secretary Clinton, who was first lady during the Rwanda genocide and whose husband has said that not intervening is one of his biggest regrets; you have Susan Rice, who was the African adviser at the time who also was--had a lot of Rwanda history there; and you had this sort of barely unlikely combination alliance between the two, along with Samantha Power who--top human rights advocate; and it's sort of, in a lot of ways, is sort of the girls took on the guys.

MR. GREGORY: Hm.

MS. COOPER: You had Gates on the other hand in the Pentagon saying, "Look, we've got..."

MR. GREGORY: And Mullen. I mean...

MS. COOPER: Right, and Mullen. You could see...

MR. GREGORY: ...you could really see that reluctance today.

MS. COOPER: ...you could see from the interview with Mullen how much that, you know, and--but they, you know, once the Arab League over the weekend sort of swung behind. There have been so many things nobody expected with the Libya case. Nobody thought the Arab League would, would come behind and say, "Yes, we want a no-fly zone as well." Once the Arab League did, you know, and these--the Obama administration was faced with this specter of possibly seeing on TV a slaughter in Benghazi. Hillary Clinton got, during a meeting in Paris, in a Paris hotel room on Tuesday met with the UAE leader, and, and he agreed to pledge Arab troops and Arab, Arab fighter pilots to the cause. And, at that point, she sort of flipped over, and that started the, the switch for Obama. But he still doesn't seem to be--his heart doesn't seem to be really in it.

MS. MITCHELL: And I think, as Helene has reported, Clinton was driving this because of what she was hearing from the allies as well. Susan Rice did a remarkable job at the U.N. No one could have predicted--even critics of the policy could not predict such a muscular resolution being approved and the abstentions from Russia and China. This came much faster than anyone expected, and it came with a--some very adept diplomacy.

MR. GREGORY: Well, and General Hayden, you said that this notion of a no-fly zone is--how do you describe it? Should not be the focus.

GEN. HAYDEN: Right, right. No. I mean, look, it wasn't the Libyan air force that was causing problems. It was the preponderance of ground power that Khaddafy could bring to bear. And so stopping them flying doesn't solve anything.

MR. GREGORY: No. It's so we can bomb them from their airspace, right? If they start to move on the ground.

GEN. HAYDEN: We have--we have to do. But I found it striking that your reporter from Tobruk said that the reaction of the opposition to this was they're putting their helmets back on, buttoning their chin straps...

MR. GREGORY: Yeah.

GEN. HAYDEN: ...and going back on the offensive. Now, what kind of dilemma policywise does that present us with if now it's the opposition on the move taking on Khaddafy's forces?

MR. GREGORY: All right. Now I want to get a quick break in here. We're going to come back and talk about this and some of the bigger questions about what comes next. More with our roundtable as the situation in Libya unfolds right after this.

(Announcements)

MR. GREGORY: We're back.

Richard Haass, let me pick up with you. The issue that was on the table is, what if now the opposition feels emboldened, and they're now on the move, and civil war starts again? What position does that put us in?

MR. HAASS: And we don't know what the political agenda of these people are. The tribal makeup of Libya is so complex. I hope that the people making the decisions in the administration have a real feel for what is going on and what are going to be the political agendas of the people we may be now empowering. But the one thing we know is that this thing now has a new lease on life. And what might have burned out is not going to, if you will, be rekindled. This is now going to be a prolonged civil war. And at some point we're going to have to decide new forms of intervention. It's not going to stop here, David. It's not going to end with simply the United States shooting off some Tomahawks or doing some aircraft runs. This is going to require, ultimately, the one thing the administration says it probably doesn't want to do, boots on the ground. Someone is going to have to provide that kind of involvement in Libya because this is a country that is going to be fundamentally divided with places people are killing each other and places the government is not in control of.

MR. GREGORY: Jim Miklaszewski, see Iraq, see Afghanistan, eight years and 10 years respectively. In Iraq, this was supposed to be in, greeted like liberators, and we were going to leave.

MR. MIKLASZEWSKI: As Yogi Berra would say, "Deja vu all over again." And to tear down a couple of facades very quickly, one, that this about a no-fly zone. It's not. As a matter of fact, U.S. Air Force F-15s and F-16s today were over Libya with the express purpose of attacking Libyan ground forces, which they did. And yesterday, Admiral Gortney said, you know, this is all about protecting civilians and the opposition forces, which gets us into the middle of that civil war that Richard was just talking about. And finally, this premise that this is a coalition effort, right now it's all U.S. It's U.S. commanded, U.S. led, U.S. military. And when Admiral Mullen was talking about handing over command of the coalition, I was told, number one, well, "We're really not in any hurry to do that." And number two, it could be an American commander.

MR. GREGORY: But, Jim, is that fair? I mean, General Hayden, I had a member of the Bush administration say to me candidly, look, can you imagine if Sarkozy was in power in 2002 as we were starting the Iraq War. You really do have the French and the British leading on this. As the senator has pointed out, the Arab League swinging behind this here. It'd be difficult, Khaddafy may try, but to make this a unilateral U.S. effort here.

GEN. HAYDEN: Oh, no. and I, I don't think anyone's saying that we should. But let's look at why people are doing these things. I think the Arab League move was quite remarkable, frankly. But with our European friends, I mean, this is about cold, hard facts. This is about mass migration. They, they have a direct interest here that they have to protect. It's no wonder that they had a greater sense of urgency about this than we did.

MR. GREGORY: Helene, the--one of the questions that I look at, you look at what's happening throughout the Middle East, revolution throughout the Middle East, and for this president, for this administration, you have to ask, what are the big ideas and are we getting the big ideas right?

MS. COOPER: It's--that's such a great question, and people are always raising the issue who, who are the strategic thinkers within this administration. And I think, you know, when--and when people ask the question of who actually drives American foreign policy in the
administration, at the end of the day, it's Obama. And that, I think, is, is sort of really interesting. But they are in such a weird position right now because you're seeing this inconsistency. We're going after Khaddafy, but we're not doing it in Bahrain. You see what happened, how long it took in Egypt, and we're very quick in Tunisia, and then Yemen,
and you've got, you know, what--we're--we have a lot of counterterrorism concerns in Yemen as well. One of the really interesting debates that came forward through--during--on the Libya front was when John Brennan, President Obama's terrorism adviser, raised the issue of the fact that a lot of these Libyan rebels have ties to al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda and the
Maghreb put out a statement on Thursday saying that they were with the Libyan opposition.

MR. HAASS: Mike Mullen says the big idea, the biggest single national security threat facing the United States is our economy, it's our fiscal situation. This will not make it better. Instead, we are ignoring a previous secretary of state, John Quincy Adams, someone you haven't had on the show in awhile. We are going abroad in search of monsters to destroy. There's any number of monsters. But is this, right now, something that's strategically necessary and vital for the United States, given all that's happening in places like Egypt, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, around the world, with all that we need to repair at home? The answer, I would think, is not. And that's the big idea the administration's missing. It's not enough to simply want to do good around the world wherever we see bad. We've got to ask ourselves, where can we do good, at what cost, against what else we might have to do?

MR. GREGORY: And, Andrea, I mean, it's values vs. interests.

MS. MITCHELL: The problem that the president has in projecting American values is that he first of all believes in a multilaterous policy. Now, on that score, he has, he has really accomplished that. This was pretty remarkable bringing this whole coalition together and getting the Arab League. But the problem of American interests is not really resolved
because our interests really, as has been said, lies in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. And there is the conflict that I think we're about to face. In Bahrain, it's already in the streets; Saudia Arabia repressed, but--and paid off by economic interests domestically. But that is the crisis.
You're going to have leadership changes there with the aging leadership sooner rather than later.

MR. GREGORY: Right.

MS. MITCHELL: And concern that what's happening in Libya could also destabilize Egypt and Tunisia and whatever gains are being made.

MR. GREGORY: And where is President Obama this weekend? He is in South America. We have pictures of him arriving in Brazil.

There's been a lot of question, Jim Miklaszewski, about the president's leadership, passivity in the face of Japan or Libya. Perhaps in that latter case that's been erased, given what he's ordered here. But here he is riding out this initial weekend in Brazil. He wasn't even the one
to announce the beginning of hostilities.

MR. MIKLASZEWSKI: Well, it's clear the White House has tried to distance itself from being at the center or in the lead of the political surge and diplomatic surge to send U.S. forces and a coalition into Libya. But I can tell you that, in all the discussions with senior U.S. military and Pentagon officials, they say that President Obama is very engaged. And his first inclination appeared to follow the advice of the SecDef Gates and Admiral Mullen to stay out of Libya.

MR. GREGORY: Bad idea, bad idea for him to be away, though, to be out of the country with this.

MS. MITCHELL: I think there's a lot to be said for not, not insulting the entire region with China advancing its economic interests in Latin America. But I think they could have found a better way for him to announce it rather than being trapped in a joint statement with the
Brazilian president and, and not really saying something aggressive.

MR. GREGORY: All right. We're going to leave it there. We'll continue to follow all of this. Thank you very much.

MR. DAVID GREGORY: Before we go, a quick programming note. Stay with NBC and MSNBC throughout the day for continuing coverage of the conflict in Libya. Our rebroadcast, we should point out, on MSNBC, airs at 2 PM and 5 PM Eastern today.

That is all for today. We'll be back next week. If it's Sunday, it's MEET THE PRESS.

First ‘Meet the Press’ photo

December 4, 1947: The earliest photograph in existence of the longest running television program in history. Sen. Robert Taft was the guest on "Meet the Press" that day, less than a month after the program debuted on NBC television at 8 p.m., November 6, 1947. James A. Farley, the former postmaster general and former Democratic National Committee chairman, was the guest on the first broadcast.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Billy Graham

March 6, 1955: Rev. Billy Graham’s first "Meet the Press" appearance. He tells panelist (and program co-founder) Lawrence Spivak "anything that makes any race feel inferior ... is not only un-American but un-Christian."
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Jackie Robinson

April 14, 1957: Jackie Robinson, the first man to break the racial barrier in Major League Baseball, also becomes the first athlete to appear on "Meet the Press." Robinson joins moderator Lawrence Spivak in a discussion about civil rights and Robinson’s work with the NAACP.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Eleanor Roosevelt

October 20, 1957: Former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in one of her six "Meet the Press" appearances. Here she talks about her trip to the Soviet Union.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Robert Frost

December 28, 1958: Poet Robert Frost was introduced by moderator Ned Brooks as "the poet of all America. Indeed, it can be said that he is the poet of all mankind." Two years later, Congress awarded Robert Frost a gold medal in recognition of his poetry, saying it enriched the culture of the United States and the philosophy of the world.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Fidel Castro

April 19, 1959: Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro appears on "Meet the Press" during his first visit to the United States since the revolution. Castro was annoyed that permanent panelist and producer Lawrence Spivak would not allow him to smoke cigars in the studio.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Martin Luthur King Jr.

April 17, 1960: Civil Rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., pictured here in one of his five "Meet the Press" appearances.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

John F. Kennedy

October 16, 1960: After this interview, then-Senator John F. Kennedy calls Meet the Press the nation's "fifty-first state."
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Jimmy Hoffa

July 9, 1961:This first "Meet the Press" appearance by Teamster president Jimmy Hoffa had to be rescheduled several times due to Hoffa’s string of indictments. After the interview, Hoffa was furious about being asked whether his insistence on dealing only in cash and keeping few records gave the appearance of impropriety.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Edward Kennedy

March 11, 1962: Edward Kennedy’s first appearance on the program. The potential Senate candidate was coached by his older brother, President John F. Kennedy. President Kennedy and his aide Theodore Sorensen prepared "Teddy" for his “Meet the Press” debut by staging a run through of questions and answers in the Oval Office. On the day of the program, President Kennedy delayed his departure from Palm Beach in order to watch the show, but later told his brother that he was almost too nervous to watch.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Bob Dole

July 16, 1972: Bob Dole and "Meet the Press" moderator Lawrence Spivak prepare to discuss the break-in and bugging of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate. Former Senator Dole holds the record for the most appearances on “Meet the Press” in a career that included service as a Congressman, Senator, RNC Chairman, vice presidential candidate, Senate Majority Leader and finally, Republican presidential nominee.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Prime Minister Wilson

September 19, 1965: "Meet the Press" conducts television’s very first live satellite interview. The guest is British Prime Minister Harold Wilson.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Ronald Reagan

September 11, 1966: Ronald Reagan, making his first bid for public office, appears on "Meet the Press" with his Democratic opponent for the governorship of California, the incumbent Gov. Edmund G. Brown. Reagan appeared on "Meet the Press" seven times -- all before he was elected president.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Robert Kennedy

March 17, 1968: Senator Robert F. Kennedy makes his ninth -- and final -- appearance on "Meet the Press" with Lawrence E. Spivak. Kennedy was assassinated in California less than 3 months later -- shortly after claiming victory in that state's Democratic presidential primary. He was 42 years old.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

John Kerry

April 18, 1971: John Kerry, then a former Navy Lieutenant, makes his first "Meet the Press" appearance as a spokesman for Vietnam Veterans Against the War. He has since appeared on the program as a U.S. Senator from Massachusetts 21 times.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Golda Meir

December 5, 1971: Golda Meir, prime minister of Israel, appears on “Meet the Press” with moderator Bill Monroe to discuss the continuing instability in the Middle East and the prospect of meeting and negotiating with Egypt’s leaders.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Prime Minister Gandhi

August 24, 1975: Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in one of her seven appearances on "Meet the Press" before her assassination in October 1984. After she was elected Prime Minister in 1966, Gandhi grew more concerned about her television image and contacted "Meet the Press" to request makeup samples used during her appearance on the program. The program’s makeup artist consulted her notes and sent Mrs. Gandhi a complete makeup set -- including sponges and instructions for application.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Gerald Ford

November 9, 1975: President Gerald Ford becomes the first sitting American president to appear on the program. President Ford accepted the invitation as a tribute to "Meet the Press" co-founder Lawrence Spivak, who was making his farewell appearance as moderator of the program.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Jimmy Carter

January 20, 1980: In one of the most dramatic newsbreaks in the history of "Meet the Press" President Jimmy Carter announces that the U.S. would boycott the Moscow Summer Olympics because of the presence of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Despite initial outrage over Carter’s proposal, 60 nations eventually joined the boycott.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Richard Nixon

April 10, 1988: In his first Sunday interview in 20 years, Former President Richard Nixon reacts to a comment on "Meet the Press.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Tim Russert's first show

December 8, 1991: Tim Russert makes his debut as moderator of "Meet the Press." He has since become the longest-serving moderator in "Meet the Press" history. In the center of this photo is then-intern Betsy Fischer, who is now Executive Producer of the program.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Dan Quayle

September 20, 1992: "Meet the Press" permanently expands from a half-hour to a one hour program. Vice President Dan Quayle is the guest.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Shaheen and Whitman

February 2, 1997: The broadcast breaks television history as "Meet the Press" becomes the first network television program ever to broadcast live in digital high definition. Governors Jeanne Shaheen and Christie Todd Whitman share a light moment on the set that day.
(Charles Rex Arbogast / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Bill Clinton

November 9, 1997: President Bill Clinton appears in studio on "Meet the Press" to mark the program’s 50th anniversary.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Al Gore

December 19, 1999: In a live Democratic presidential debate, Vice President Al Gore challenges former Sen. Bill Bradley to a "Meet the Press agreement" to have weekly debates in place of running political advertisements.
(Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Dick Cheney

September 16, 2001: Five days after the September 11th attacks, Vice President Dick Cheney joins moderator Tim Russert in the first live television interview ever broadcast from Camp David.
(Getty Images)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Senate Debate Series

September 22, 2002: "Meet the Press" kicks off its "Senate Debate Series" with the Colorado Senate race: Republican Incumbent Sen. Wayne Allard vs. Democratic Challenger Tom Strickland. At the end of the election cycle, the series of three senate debates was awarded the prestigious "USC Walter Cronkite Journalism Award" for "Excellence in Broadcast TV Political Journalism." The debate series continued in 2004 and 2006.
(Alex Wong / Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

George W. Bush

February 8, 2004: President George W. Bush kicks off his re-election campaign in an Oval Office interview with Tim Russert on "Meet the Press." Robert Novak went on to write about the interview, "no president ever before had been subjected to such tough questioning in the Oval Office."
(Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

James Carville

November 14, 2004: In another "Meet the Press" first, Democratic strategist James Carville cracks an egg on his forehead to demonstrate he's got "egg on his face" after his projected outcome of the U.S. presidential election was wrong. Carville predicted 52 percent of the vote for U.S. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), 47 percent for President George W. Bush and 1 percent for Ralph Nader.
(Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Jim Webb

November 19, 2006: The first edition of "Meet the Press" to be available via video netcast on the show’s Web site. U.S. Senator-elect Jim Webb (D-Va.) joins moderator Tim Russert on that program.
(Alex Wong / Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

June 15, 2008: The chair of late moderator Tim Russert sits empty on the set during the first MTP taping following Russert's death. He died June 13, 2008 of a heart attack while at the NBC News bureau in Washington. He was 58 years old.
(Alex Wong / Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

President-elect Obama

December 7, 2008: President-elect Barack Obama makes his first Sunday morning television appearance since winning the election to discuss the challenges facing this country and the upcoming transition of power.
(Scott Olson / Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

David Gregory

December 7, 2008: Interim moderator Tom Brokaw announces that David Gregory has been chosen as the new moderator of the show.
(Alex Wong / Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Rendell, Schwarzenegger & Bloomberg

March 22, 2009: Gov. Ed Rendell (D-Penn.), Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-Calif.) and NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg appeared exclusively on Meet the Press one day after meeting with President Obama to discuss the economy.
(Brendan Smialowski / Getty Images for Meet the Press)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Hillary Clinton

July 26, 2009: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appears for a full-hour on Meet the Press. It's her first appearance on the program since joining the Obama administration.
(William B. Plowman / NBC Universal)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

President Obama

September 20, 2009: President Barack Obama sits down with David Gregory at the White House for Obama's first MTP appearance since taking office.
(Pete Souza / The White House)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Editor's note:
This image contains graphic content that some viewers may find disturbing.